Post navigation

I’m A Bit Of An Arsehole

I may have gotten a bit soft as well. People have been mentioning that lately, and I guess it’s time to confront that demon.

“You don’t swear as much.”, or “You aren’t as biting as you used to be.”

Both true and valid points. The fact of the matter is that I’m very happy, and I don’t feel like being mean or snarky.

Except on Sunday. Sunday was the day that I started this blog post. It was going to be posted on Monday, but I was too tired to finish the last little bit, so I went to bed. I had a good sleep, and got up Monday morning to publish it, and as I read it back, I was suddenly ashamed of myself. I deleted it all.

I asked myself, Who the fuck am I to be so high and mighty?

The reason is that I had completely trashed a lot of people’s hard work, hope, and possibly dreams, for the sake of humour. I was laughing as I wrote it, and thought that because I didn’t mention names, nobody would get hurt. I thought that I could just spew a bunch of bullshit, and that it would be alright because I was a bit ticked off and like to blow things out of proportion. Anyhow, I just got rid of it. Partly because of a speaker I heard at Blissdom, but a lot of it had to do with me. I think I’m growing again. I’m not saying this is a permanent thing, but I kind of hope it is. I hope I can still be funny without making someone feel bad about themselves. I guess we’ll see. Now for the new post. It’s a long one.

I went to Blissdom Canada on the weekend. It was not what I was expecting. The conference part, that is. The meeting some of my blogging “heroes” part was awesome. Did you know that they bleed the same as we do? I gave JC “The Animated Woman” a papercut with my razor-sharp, and beautifully designed, business card, and it was red, just like ours. (I got a drop on a slide for analysis.) Relax, it was just her arm. We got her bandaged up in time for the microsessions, and when I explained that I was afraid that she was an alien because I’ve never seen drawings like hers, she totally understood.

Seriously. You think she’s an alien too, right? Click the image to find out all about pinworms. I said “click it”

In all honesty, she was very sweet, demure, and quite foxy. She introduced me to Katie Motherbumper and she was really nice too. I had a look at her blog, and it’s very cool and colourful. She’s a bit of a iphonography buff, and has a great eye for finding unique shots. She also shares the apps that she loves for her iphoneography, which is good if you like iphones and all that stuff. Another cool thing about Katie was that she taught me how to back up my WordPress blog with a scheduled backup. Remember when I deleted my whole blog that one time about six or so months ago? No? That’s because none of you bastards read it back then. I didn’t know about backing things up. Luckily Godaddy keeps things backed up for a month at a time, so I got it back in a couple of hours, but shit got pretty tense for a bit. Now, I know to set it to back itself up at 3 AM every morning. Thanks, Katie.

I then got to meet the first blogger that I ever liked and also admired. I realized that I needed to see what a blog looked like, before I went too far on the wrong track, so I Googled “funny Canadian blogs”, or something like that, and found a list with Attack of the Redneck Mommy at the top of it. There was a review or something about her being the most popular funny blogger in Canada, and saying that she had over three billion followers. That maybe an exaggeration, but at the time, I had eight followers, so it seemed like it to me. I remember thinking that I had to go through and read all of her posts to see how blogging was supposed to be done. When I saw that she had 30 years worth of reading, I tucked my penis between my legs, and just subscribed to her RSS feed.

I got to sit in on a microsession with her and learn a bit about humour writing. This also weighed in on my decision to scrap the last post.

She said “I don’t write snark.”

After I questioned the word, I sat there wondering whether I write snark. I suppose I do. Just because I don’t put someone’s name in, doesn’t mean they can’t be hurt by it. I’m pretty snarky in my disdain for religious zealots and people who don’t respect the rights and freedoms of others. I am also very hard on people who click what I think is stupid shit on Facebook. I’ll bet I’ve deleted 100-200 friends over the years for that. Anyhow, I can’t promise I’ll change, but I’ll make a conscious effort at least.

All of these ladies have great blogs, but they are nothing like mine, and nothing like each other’s. The Redneck Mommy is an excellent writer, who is funny, touching, and loves dead bird jewellery. Her posts have almost brought me to tears, but there is always enough humour to keep me from actually bawling.

JC is very funny too. She’s sometimes serious, sometimes thought provoking, but always drawing. She has inspired me for probably the last eight months or so, since I found her. Katie is very new to me, but it doesn’t take long to whip through a ton of photos, so that’s what I did. It says on there that she used to write, and if I get a minute someday, I may go back and check those posts out, but for now, I’ll just enjoy her photos. I also met a bunch of other ladies (Darleen, Olga, etc…) that were quite lovely, fun, and thoughtful, but due to not wanting a 4000 word post, I’ll leave it at that and move on to the speakers.

I really enjoyed two of them, and a third one was okay. The two that really held my attention were Bonnie Stewart and Susan Cain. I really feel that they were the only two worth money to listen to, but I’m sure that Amber Mac was very helpful to a lot of people. Jian Ghomeshi and Ami McKay were there too, and while they were good enough speakers, I just didn’t find them relevant.

There was a lot of things that disappointed me about this conference, but the only reason is that I’m a different type of blogger than most of the people there, and I was really hoping to sit down with some other G+ enthusiasts for a pow wow. As it turns out, no one there was really into Google+ very much. I guess if I end up going back next year, I’ll see if I can host a round table for G+ if anyone is interested in learning about it. Another thing that I didn’t like was the long breaks between events and for lunch. Two hours is a long time to wait around, so if I do go back, I’ll probably get a room to go have naps in.

The Bliss Chicks worked their asses off to put this shindig together, and they deserve a huge pat on the back. To get this all arranged, sussed out, and then to actually make it happen??? Forget about it. Just the sponsors alone…

Shit. I forgot about the fucking sponsors.

They were really fantastic too. Now before you get all pissy, because the advertising is coming, just hear me out. These companies came there and gave us top notch everything, with no strings attached. We were fed and watered at no cost to us, and it was all in the hope that we would mention them. Well, I’m going to tell you about the ones that stuck in my mind, because if we don’t at least do that, then they might not come back next time.

Kraft Canada was there with some food from a new(er) campaign of theirs: http://www.cookingwithphilly.ca/. I had the bruschetta bowtie pasta that was made with Philly Cooking Cream. Fucking delicious. Truly. I haven’t tried cooking with it, but they said they just followed the recipe and it was done. I am going to try this, because I think both girls would eat it (I’m delusional). The little bruschettas were great too, but I can’t find the recipe, so you’ll have to look it up if you want it.

Starbucks was there with these new coffee machines that do lattes and espresso almost instantly. The machines were $199 and $399, and the pods were $13 for eight lattes, so you can be damn sure I won’t be getting one of those. The coffee and the baristas though, were fantastic, and believe me, after sitting up until around 3AM with Sebastard, I went through a pile of them. Coffees, not baristas. They also sent me home with a gift bag, and it was great. Tubes of chocolates, a cold cup, and a $5 gift card. Pretty damn sweet. Thank you, Starbucks.

I am going to get killed when I give this to a seven year old for xmas. Wish me luck.

Maple Leaf Foods gave us great gift bags full of bread, coupons, and the weirdest figurine I’ve ever seen. I tried the potato and the baguettes so far, and while homemade is way better, this stuff is really good for store bought.

Care.ca gave us a little care package with a flash drive, energy bar, water and Hershey’s Kisses. I really have no clue who they are, but they really seemed passionate about helping people. Like almost too passionate.

If it hadn’t been for Cotton-Eyed Joe, I’d a been married a long time ago,

I would go with you, but to just set out and stand around by myself, sucked. It wasn’t like there was no one to talk to, but I just didn’t have a lot in common with very many people. If you want to go to Georgia next fall, to the Aiming Low Non-Con. I am thinking of saving up for that one. I hear it’s not a typical conference, and that everybody loved it. I’d even go to this one again, but I’d make plans with someone, share a room, and relax.

As for G+, people don’t realize that you need to be on it. Not because of the social aspect, but because Google is changing the way the searches work. You need Google authorship to replace the steadily more defunct SEO and backlinks. I don’t use any of it, really, but I find it interesting nonetheless. I would have to change my theme if I want the rel=author link to work, and I love my theme, so I’m SOL.

Dude. You did not have to attend my session on how to be funny. You’ve got that box all wrapped up with a pretty little bow, all by yourself. Just keep doing what you are doing, and keep having fun while doing it. It was an honest to God pleasure meeting you.

And I hope that next year you do present a session on G+ because you are consistently one of the highlights over there and I have no damn idea what I’m supposed to be doing over there.

Now excuse me, but I’m on the hunt for crazy people wandering the hospital halls with their arses hanging out of their gowns.

Thank you, that was the compliment that I was fishing for. I know I didn’t have to, but you have a different kind of humour, or subtlety that I was hoping would rub off on me. I can’t believe I just used subtlety in a comment to describe you. You know what I mean.

I hope you get a piece of that crazy arse you’re so desperately hunting. It shouldn’t be running too fast; being hamstrung and all.

^Dude, you’re so loveable. I was just showing your blog to The Huz and we agree – you have a distinct Canadian flavour (note the “u” in that word) to your voice that makes us adore you. Thoughtful and hilarious too. Yep. No pressure. Keep’em coming.

Congratulations on surviving your first blogging conference. My papercut is healing nicely but the jury’s still out on whether I made it past the Saturday morning hangover.

While the infected person sleeps, female pinworms lay thousands of eggs in the folds of skin surrounding the anus. Most people infected with pinworms have no symptoms, but some people experience anal itching and restless sleep. ..*-”